Schools, rules and jobs

A Q&A with Council President Tony Young and Council members Lorie Zapf and Kevin Faulconer

FAULCONER: We had an audit with a variety of performance recommendations. Those types of audits never happened before in the city up till about two years ago. They were taking three weeks to check an insurance permit when it really only should take one week. They were kicking out bids that maybe didn’t have one subset of the application, relatively minor, filled out. One wasn’t put into a three-ring binder. And they would reject the whole bid.

ZAPF: They didn’t have a little initial properly next to something, minor things.

Q: Consultants say the Internet productivity revolution of the 1990s has never reached the public sector, that not nearly enough government work is done online. Have you looked at this?

YOUNG: The city clerk and I are working on creating a paperless City Hall. So we agree. We’re looking at the best practices.

FAULCONER: With the entertainment permit, some entities that still have to get a permit have to download it offline. You have to print it out and go into the city in person. You can get an airline ticket online, but with this permit, you have to go to City Hall. We have to change that culture. We should do vastly more permitting and a variety of things online.

Q: Some states have ombudsmen to help businesses deal with obstacles that may not be necessary. Are you looking at this?

ZAPF: That’s the idea with the small-business liaison that just got hired. An example is a place that sells prepared foods in a local shopping center. The city forced them to install a $3,000, $5,000 grease trap because they were selling foods. It doesn’t make any sense because there’s no preparing on site.

Q: Environmental regulations draw complaints, but you’ll get pushback from the environmental community defending those regulations.

YOUNG: And you’re going to get pushback from me if there are recommendations to take back environmental regulations that are really important to the city and citizens of San Diego. I don’t think that’s what we’re talking about here.

Q: But you’re talking about paperwork and with hazardous materials and toxic waste, it often is pretty important. If somebody’s not putting a lid on a barrel, why should that be a fine? Well, a lot of pollution is coming out of that barrel.

ZAPF: I’ve never thought of environmental regulations when I thought about streamlining regulations.

FAULCONER: That’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about other things – why it takes six months to award a contract when it should take two or three months. Having the proper regulations, but not regulations that are outdated, don’t make sense and eat time, because time is money.

Q: I talked to a big developer who said he’s all for planning and zoning, but it’s got to be crystal-clear, what are the risk factors, will it get approved, how long will it take? They want clarity, not permissiveness.

FAULCONER: It’s clear rules of the road. There are very clear rules of the road at [the Center City Development Corp.]. You can do this. You can do that, a variety of things. That’s a big reason we’ve had such success in redevelopment downtown.

YOUNG: If we know it works, why are we not doing that everywhere in the city of San Diego? There’s no reason why rules should be different in my district when it comes to getting things through.